Do you know how to dance? and other such questions...Kenya Week 11: November 13-December 19

As part of my new job working with the HIV/AIDS Prevention program AWAKE, I helped facilitate a five day volunteer training for the Catholic Diocese. 24 volunteers came from each parish in the diocese to learn the basics of HIV/AIDS, Life skills, and Peer Education so they can in turn train the youth in their parishes and local schools. The basic idea: teach adults how to teach kids life skills and the basics of HIV/AIDS Prevention. Being the local “Public Health Officer” AND the token American, the volunteers came to me with any question concerning health, HIV/AIDS, STIs, and of course, the state of being in our beloved United States.

Many of the questions were incredibly relevant and insightful:
o How has the HIV/AIDS epidemic affected food security?
o How long can the HIV virus survive outside the body?
o If a baby is born with both male and female parts, is it a male or a female?
o Why do many of the symptoms for STIs only affect women and not men?

Others made me realize we have a big job to do concerning health and sexual health education:
o Can you get HIV by kissing?
o Why do women stay longer with the virus than men? (Translation: Why do HIV+ men died sooner than HIV+ women?)
o Do people with the HIV virus go to heaven?

Others just made me laugh. Here is a sample of the more noteworthy inquiries regarding Obama-land:
o Do you have potatoes in America?
o Do old people get taken care of in America?
o Do you have grass in America?
o If you don’t have ugali or sukuma wiki in America, what do you eat?
o Is it true that men are only allowed to have one wife in America?

And of course, they all wanted to know:
o Do you have a husband?
o How many children do you have?
o Which team are you for? (Translation: Are you a Manchester United or Chelsea fan? Translation: Do you watch European Football?)
o Do you know how to dance?

It was an exhausting, intense four days of training. My brain was tired mostly from having to explain what Americans eat other than ugali and sukuma wiki. But we managed to have fun and ended Thursday evening with a dance party! And not to brag or anything, but apparently I’m a good dancer according to Kenyan standards.

From Rongo we headed to Homa Bay, the headquarters for our Catholic Diocese. The diocesan employees close out their year with Staffmass, a four day (yes, a full four days!) party. We only attended the last afternoon of festivities which included speeches (a Kenyan staple for ANY social gathering), giving out gifts, and of course, a dance party!! Encouraged by the “You really know how to dance like a Kenyan” comments I’d received the night before, Nancy and I had a great time dancing into the night! And again as the token mzungu, I must have danced with over half the males currently employed by the Homa Bay Catholic Diocese!!

And just in case I hadn’t had enough Christmas celebrations or dancing, we made it back to Karungu just in time for the much anticipated St. Camillus Hospital Staff Christmas Party. Luckily this time I wasn’t the only mzungu and actually knew most of the people. Lauren, Christy, Jimmy, and I still managed to be the highlight of the dance party. I’ve figured out that Kenyans just want to know how us white people dance.

So as it turns out, the answer to your question is:
YES, I do know how to dance.
YES, America does have potatoes.
YES, men in America are only allowed to have one wife.

Jiggers Infestations, Public Transportations, and Priestly Ordinations... Kenya Week 10: December 6-December 12

What happens when your schedule includes an Ordination in Nairobi on December 12, a Volunteer Training in Rongo December 13-18th, a Christmas Party in Homa Bay on the 18th, followed by another Christmas Party in Karungu on the 19th? Ten days of intense traveling, talking, sitting, eating, and not sleeping. I’ve barely seen a computer in the past 10 days! But I’m happily back on the porch overlooking the endless Lake Victoria in the dry Karungu heat. Let me fill you in on the highlights of my life in Kenya the past two weeks!!

Monday, December 6, 2009 We found a young boy, Rocky, with jiggers in his feet last week during the Mobile Maternal and Child Health Clinic at a nearby village called Otati. I removed the jiggers but knew we needed to spray their home to kill those still living in the dirt floor. I organized to bring disinfectant and a sprayer to spray any homes in Otati with jiggers. Frank (the nurse that help us so much with removing Mary, Michael, and Gaston’s jiggers) graciously agreed take me on his day off to spray the homes. We rode out on his motorbike and disinfected Rocky’s home and one other home. The older couple living in the home had a serious case and we agreed that I would return on Thursday to remove their jiggers at the dispensary.
Tuesday and Wednesday, December 7 and 8, 2009 I helped facilitate another Life-skills training with AWAKE. The trainng was just down the road at B.L. Tezza, the primary and secondary school for orphans run by St. Camillus. The kids were a joy to teach and seemed to enjoy the training.

Thursday, December 10, 2009 I traveled with the ART Clinic (Anti-Retroviral Therapy for HIV/AIDS patients) to Otati to remove the jiggers from the husband and wife we met on Moday. We also brought a bed and mattress for Rocky’s family. They’d been sleeping on a mat on the ground, one of the common problems causing jiggers infections. Between bringing the bed to the home and rumors of a mzungu removing jiggers at the dispensary, a crowd of mothers and their barefooted children, all infected with jiggers quickly gathered. Before we knew it, we had over 35 different families reporting at least one child with a jiggers infection! a.k.a. Jiggers Outbreak in Otati!! Now I’m coordinating with the local nurse, village chief and government public health officer to arrange a community wide day for disinfection and removal of jiggers. Hopefully these sweet kids will be jigger free by Christmas (or at least the New Year!).

 

This is Rocky's little brother David. The family was so excited to finally have a bed and mattress.

Despite the unexpected outbreak discovery, I still managed to be back to Sori to catch the “night bus” with Lauren and Christy to travel to Nairobi. The night bus leaves Sori at 4:30 pm and inches its way towards the capital city, picking up passengers, sugar cane, corn, goats, chickens, and anything else that may be traveling to the booming metropolis. Lauren tells the story better than I possibly can. Check out her latest blog: http://laurenmeisman.blogspot.com/

Friday, December 11, 2009 After a fitful night’s sleep constantly interrupted by crying baby, a gawking chicken, and constant stop and go on the half paved highways, we arrived in Nairobi at 3:30 am. We stayed on the bus till the driver kicked us off in the pre-dawn haze of the city-center. The three blonde, young, and sleepy mzungus broke through the crowds of vendors, bicycles, push carts, taxis, and buses till we managed to escape the markets and arrive at the Kenyan Embassy to renew our visas. I won’t go into details of renewing my visa, but lets just say in a notoriously corrupt country, sometimes its helpful being blonde, young, and from America! Apparently my feminine charms exempt me from the hassles of the entire visa renewal process and no, Mr. Embassy Worker, you cannot have my phone number (but thanks for making this whole ordeal quite easy!)
We spent the afternoon finding a hotel and a decent place to eat lunch then shopping for beautiful Kenyan fabric. Kangas, kitanges, and kikoyos are literally the fabrics holding Kenyan life together. These versatile materials are a day to day necessity for a Kenyan woman: they become everything from the tablecloth to baby sling to travel bath towel. They’re sewn into exquisite Sunday dresses, men’s shirts, and grocery bags. The unbelievable diversity of materials, patterns, colors, and written messages on the fabrics made the afternoon an explosion of color and battering. Not exactly like shopping in the sterile and set-price atmosphere of an American mall and the three Mzungus had a blast! We bought fresh baked bread, peanut butter, and apples (all of which are priceless in Karungu!)at the grocery store and ate dinner in our hotel room before falling asleep at 8 pm!

 

Kenyan kangas, kitanges, and kikoyos in one of the many shops on our shopping spree!

Saturday, December 12, 2009 We really came all the way to Nairobi to attend the Camillian Ordinations and Final Professions. Richard was ordained a priest while Elphas, Thomas, and Joseph took their final vows as brothers. We’ve become friends with almost all the Camillians in Kenya, especially the younger brothers and seminarians and we were happy to be there for their big day. The celebration was beautiful and lasted all day!! In the evening we managed to enjoy a bit of Nairobi nightlife, which was a treat after being “in the bush” of Karungu!!

The Meaning of Friendship...Kenya Week 9: November 29-December 5

 

“What is a friend?” Daniel asked the group of middle school children.

“Someone you like.”
“Someone who gives you his things.”
“Someone who is your neighbor.”
“Someone you trust.”
“Someone who helps you.”

The idea that a friend is simply someone who gives you his things or helps you surprised me initially. Is it because these kids have so little that a friend is anyone that gives them something? All of the children, aged 10 to 17, are partial or total orphans and are sponsored by the Mercy Orphans Group, a large organization within the Catholic Relief Services. Mercy Orphans sponsors 75% of their school fees, provides support for their caretakers, and trains teachers and volunteers to assist these needy youth. As a part of their school sponsorship they must attend a 4-day “Life skills Training” course. Sitting in a circle in a dilapidated schoolroom on incredibly uncomfortable desks, these children learn about everything from Communication, Being Assertive, Self Esteem, and Setting Goals to HIV/AIDS, Rape, Sex, and Abstinence. I was blessed to spend two days learning and laughing alongside these beautiful kids.

After two months of working in the Maternal and Child Health Clinic, I have decided I want to utilize my skills as a “Public Health Officer” and spend more time in the community. While I’ve had incredibly valuable experiences working in the Clinic and helping in the Wards, I’m hoping to learn more about life, health, and poverty outside the gates of St. Camillus. After coordinating with Father Emilio, nurses, social workers, and volunteers at the hospital, I’ll be volunteering with AWAKE. AWAKE is a youth HIV/AIDS Prevention Program that reaches kids in the classroom to teach them about HIV/AIDS and how to avoid becoming infected. Starting in January, (when the kids go back to school) I’ll help give talks and facilitate discussions along with the other AWAKE workers. The AWAKE Coordinators, Angela, Daniel, and Mary, are excited to have me on board: hopefully the mzungu (white person) will make the kids pay more attention rather than distract them. And I am looking forward to the opportunity to “be in the field” and to impact, in some small way, the lives of the students we reach with the AWAKE Program.

After the first day of my “new job”, I couldn’t help but reflect on Daniel’s talk about friendship. I realized the children’s response that a friend is someone who gives you his things is not simply a result of their poverty or need. It is not a way of seeing a friend as someone to take advantage of. Rather, it is acknowledging that a true friend will give till it hurts. They’ll share from their own poverty to help someone they care about. This is universal: my friends give me not only their things, but also their time, patience, support, love, and joy. Good answer kids.

Even more surprising than the students’ response to Daniel’s question about friends was his next question to the students:

“How many children do you think Kayla has?”

Wait, WHAT!?!

Some kids giggled. Others quickly guessed the number of my offspring:
“2!”
“3!”

WHAT, I’m only 22?!?!!?!

I quickly clarified: “ONGE!!” (“NONE!!”)

“Kayla doesn’t have any children because she wants to complete her education and accomplish her goals.”

Where are you going with this Daniel?

“And so Kayla chooses friends that will help her accomplish these goals. Her friends also work hard and want to accomplish their goals and dreams.”

Ok Daniel, nice recovery. I guess the fact that most Kenyan girls have at least 2 children by the age of 22 makes me a good role model for these girls. I’m glad my fertility could help you clarify what it means to be a good friend.


All in all, it was a wonderful training. The kids seem to pay attention and even managed to have some fun. I can only hope something sunk in and they’ll keep themselves and their friends virus-free. Who knows? Maybe they even learned a life skill or two.

ONLY IN AFRICA: Kenya Week 8...November 21-28

 

ONLY IN AFRICA...

o Do four Americans, five Italians, eight Kenyans, and one Tanzanian sit down together to share a Thanksgiving Dinner.

o Does someone taste stuffing, chicken gravy, and apple pie for the first time in their life and love them!!

o Is World AIDS Day the biggest event of the year.

o Do children’s nursery rhymes ask, “AIDS, AIDS, do you have no mercy?”

o Do World AIDS Day Weekend festivities include a football tournament, a net ball tournament, an eating contest, and hours upon hours of skits, songs and dances.

o Is the highlight of the World AIDS Day festivities a dance off for young boys.

o Does the winner of the dance off win $6 because he hip-thrusts and gyrates better than the other boys.

o Only in Africa will the answers to the question, “Why is HIV/AIDS such a problem in this community?” include Wife Inheritance, Polygamy, and Boredom.

o Is an eight year old girl HIV positive while her mother is HIV negative.

o Does a 60 year old woman get admitted to the hospital for Malaria when she actually has an ear infection.

o Does an 8 year old boy get sent home from the outpatient clinic with a broken femur.

o Does a woman’s dead body get carried home on a motorbike.

o Does one country have 42 different tribes with their separate languages, cultures, believes, and traditions.

o Does the man building your home not show up for three weeks to finish cementing the floors and walls.

o Do lake flies attack a hospital in such numbers that you can hardly see through the cloud on your way home from work.

o Does a white girl get proposed to at least once a week by hospital patients, motorbike drivers, shop owners and strangers on the street.

o Am I constantly mistaken as an Italian and a nurse because I’m white.

Home is where the Heart Is …Kenya Week 7: November 15-22

Sitting in my room at the St. Camillus Seminary in Nairobi, I caught myself off guard when the thought, “I want to go home!” popped into my head on Monday evening. But the “home” I imagined was not Lee’s Summit, Missouri or New Orleans, Louisiana. Suddenly “home” meant Karungu, Kenya. In seven short yet powerful weeks, my paradigm shifted once again: I live in Africa. I work at a hospital in the bush. My friends are Italian volunteers, Kenyan seminarians, and Luo nurses. For fun I play with my beautiful neighbor children, run on muddy cattle trails, write letters, and read books. And one week away from home was too much. I wanted to be back. I wanted to give vaccines to babies, to speak broken Duluo, to laugh with the seminarians and priests at dinner, to constantly scrape mud from my shoes, and to watch the sunset over the lake.

This unexpected Karungu-homesickness nestled down right next down to my America-homesickness. Undeniably, while in Africa I’ve yearned for the comforts and security of my America-home more than ever before. I miss the paved roads, warm showers, and the luxurious beauty of the developed world. I miss grocery shopping, cooking dinner for my family, going to the movies, and leaving the house after the sunset. I miss the Streetcar bumbling down St. Charles Ave in New Orleans and the parasite-free lakes in Kansas City. I miss the instant and reliable communication with my loved ones. I miss feeling safe enough to travel alone and I miss blending in.

Yet when I look around me, I realize most of the people in Karungu can barely fathom what it means to miss such extravagant homes. Gaston, Michael, and Mary were thrilled to return to their new jigger-free, concrete-slab, one-room home. Mary the Nurse Aid wishes her home had running water so she wouldn’t have to fetch it from the lake every morning. Emma the Cleaner wishes she had her own home so she and her children wouldn’t be at the mercy of her landlord when she can’t afford to pay the month’s rent. The children at Dala Kiye have a beautiful home, loving caretakers, three meals a day, and school fees so they can graduate high school. Although they’re HIV+ and orphaned, they may be the most blessed kids in all of Karungu. Meanwhile the other 5,000 orphans and vulnerable children around Karungu have no home to miss. Day in and day out they struggle to find a roof to sleep under, a decent meal to eat, and a relative to pay their school fees.

Back at home in Karungu, I still miss home. And since I miss Amanda while she’s at home in New York recovering from surgery, I wrote her a letter telling her to come home soon.

My home is Lee’s Summit, New Orleans, Karungu. My family and friends send me precious letters from California, Arizona, Texas, Louisiana, Missouri, Belgium, Swaziland, Chile, and Iraq. How blessed I am to have so many homes and so many loved ones. If “Home is where the Heart Is”, then my heart is scattered across the globe in countless pieces.

 

 

My beautiful neighbors back home in Karungu.

Literally, Sticks will break your bones!!... Kenya Week 6: November 8-November 14

Call it bad luck or just bad timing, but turns out that last week’s blog titled “Sticks and Stones May Break My Bones…” would have been a more appropriate title for this week’s blog. Let me tell you a little story…

It was a beautiful Sunday afternoon in rural Karungu Kenya. Men, women and children walked along the side of the road to and from the booming Sori Market to buy dried fish, corn, second hand clothes and an assortment of other Kenyan goods . Cars, buses and motorbikes sped up and down the dirt road, narrowly missing each other and those walking along the muddy roadside. Among those innocently heading to the market were three American volunteers named Kayla, Amanda, and Lauren. The lovely young ladies wanted to buy clothes and shoes for a poor family they are helping at the hospital.

Suddenly a motorbike driver with a large wooden door attached to the back of his tiny bike swerved dangerously close to the jolly group. The girls jumped to the side just in time, all except for poor Amanda’s left forearm. Perhaps unaware of how large his door actually was or perhaps simply just a bad driver, this young man rudely cut their good hearted trip short.

Amanda bravely held back tears and while grasping her arm informed the merry group that the Sori Market would have to wait; she needed to head back to St. Camillus. Now Lauren conveniently happened to be the St. Camillus X-ray technician, so the girls went straight to the X-ray room. Sadly, X-rays don’t lie: Amanda’s arm had a minimally displaced mid-shaft radial fracture. In other words, her left radius was broken in two. The moral of the story: My mom was right…sticks really do break bones. THE END

After Dr. Jimmy splinted Amanda’s arm and she got some pain killers, everyone decided the best option would be for Amanda to come to Nairobi so an orthopedic surgeon could set the bone and properly cast it. We contacted all the necessary folks back in the States (Mom and Dad Ailleo, Richard from CMMB, etc.) and Fr. Emilio made some calls to find the best orthopedic in Nairobi. We decided I would travel to Nairobi with Amanda to continue playing the role of roommate, friend, nurse, and surrogate mother. So on Tuesday morning Father Julius, Amanda, and I made the eight hour trek to the capital.

Unfortunately after taking one look at the X-ray, Dr. Krishnan told Amanda that if it was his arm, he’d opt for surgery. Casting her arm won’t guarantee that the bone will realign and heal properly because of the location and type of break. It will heal much better and much faster with a plate and screws holding the bones in place. So instead of getting a cast and returning to Nairobi like we originally hoped, Amanda boarded a plane back to New York for surgery.

 

While poor Amanda is back home awaiting surgery, I’ve been relaxing at the St. Camillus Seminary and exploring Nairobi with Fr. Julius. Instead of playing nurse and roommate, I’ve had a unplanned vacation!! In the morning I read, drink coffee, and fully appreciate the excellent internet by uploading photos onto Facebook. In the afternoons Father and I run errands throughout Nairobi with wonderful side trips to see some of the city’s highlights. The Catholic University of East Africa, the Bomas of Kenya (a park and cultural center), the beautiful Benedictine Monastery, Togoni District Hospital, the August 7th Memorial Park (for the 1998 U.S. Embassy Bombing) the Kenyatta International Conference Center (with an rooftop view of Nairobi), the Westlands Market, and many of the neighborhoods in and around the city (the Kibiera Slums, Langatta, Westlands, Parklands, City Center…). I pass the hours stuck in traffic practicing Kiswahili and listening to Father Julius’s funny priesthood stories.

 

 

It’s been an unexpected yet pleasant vacation, sadly at the expense of Amanda’s arm (for those of you from the Gulf Coast, the closest thing I can compare this to is a Hurrication!!). But after five days in the city, I’m more than ready to return to the bush of Karungu!! I need to get back to work (that’s why I’m in Kenya after all!) and I miss the clean air and beautiful sunsets over the lake. Till then, I’ll continue enjoying the bustling city life of Nairobi!

Sticks and Stones May Break My Bones…Kenya Week 5: November 1-November 7

I remember being a little girl and crying to my mother after being teased by my sisters or neighborhood friend. Attempting to comfort me, she taught me the age old adage, “Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words can never hurt me”. After five weeks in Kenya, I’m sad to say that for once, my mother was wrong. Turns out that “Sticks and stones (and motor bikes and machetes and alcohol and all sorts of dangerous objects) can break your bones, but words can actually kill you”.

Being from a country where everyone speaks the same language and little patience is awarded those who don’t, the language barrier faced by Kenyans within their own country seems particularly debilitating. The cycle of poverty and illiteracy perpetuates itself as young girls drop out of school because they can’t pay their fees and suddenly find themselves married with 4 children.

I’ve seen it over and over. Kenyans grow up speaking their Mother tongue, be it Duluo, Kisii, Kimeru, Kiswahili, or any of the 42 tribal languages in Kenya. Children only learn English (the Official Language of Kenya) and Kiswahili (the National Language of Kenya) in school. That is, if they go to school: with a national average High School enrollment of only 25% in the best regions, very few Kenyans actually speak English or Kiswahili. When almost all official documents, reports, etc. are written in English, working as anything other than a substance farmer or fisherman becomes nearly impossible. People are limited to working and living among their own tribe which limits their ability to trade goods, travel, or improve their quality of life.

Accessing quality medical care falls into the exact same category. The Maternal and Child Health Clinic’s walls are plastered with colorful and informational posters on everything from protecting your child from Malaria, to knowing your HIV status, to proper nutrition for infants. Unfortunately all the posters are in English or Kiswahili which means few of our clients can actually read them. The handy little Immunization Cards and Tuberculosis Medication Charts given to each client serve as little more than reminders of when to return to the clinic. At least the clients understand the dates written in the “To Come Again” column.

As I learn the Duluo language Mus Mus (slowly by slowly), I am again reminded of the difficulties and depth of a language barrier. As a mzungu (a white foreigner), I at least given the benefit of the doubt and endless patience as I attempt to communicate. But for those Kenyans who were not fortunate to learn English or Kiswahili (like my beloved Jiggers Family), I simply pray for their safety and comfort. In a world where knowledge is power and the pen is mightier than the sword, the beautiful Luo Tribe on the shores of Lake Victoria fight everyday to improve their lot. What a blessing to be a small part of their battle.